良
liáng HSK4

good

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approved by Marcus Ngai · Aug 1, 2026, 03:03 AM · Reviewed by Marcus Ngai on Aug 1, 2026, 03:03 AM

Tacked on source

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Original meaning: hallway

Depicts the hallway of a pit house, featuring two entrances for proper airflow, now written as 廊. Based on the original meaning "hallway". The meaning later expanded to "good".

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Mid Western Zhou ~900 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Spring and Autumn ~700 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Qin 221-206 BC
Clerical form
Clerical Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartljang[r]aŋ good

說文解字

《說文》：“良，善也。从畗省，亡聲。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫季旭昇《說文新證》p.460
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)